How To Be A Deadass New Yorker

Ayo, Deadass, Word

By: Marcus Del Valle

New Yorkers are, deadass, a different breed of people. Real talk, if someone asks you what you’re eating for breakfast, and your answer isn’t baconeggandcheese (one word), then you ain’t a deadass New Yorker. On the real, people ain’t like us. Like, deadass. We different. We unique. We New York. Word.

New York started this rap shit. A lot of people nowadays arguin’ about who the best rapper is when all the best rappers came from here. Biggie, Big Pun, Big L and The Locs. They are always deadass.

A lot of people don’t get it, but if you do then you’re deadass too. Most of the time being deadass can get taken out of context and people just think you are angry all that time. That ain’t the truth.

You might be asking, “Dog whatchumean by deadass?”

Lemme tell you.

To be deadass – you gotta be real. Word. You gotta be hard. Word. And, you gotta be loyal. Word.

I ain’t neva met someone who was unloyal and deadass at the same time. It just doesn’t work that way. Those people are called fake. Avoid their asses.

What it means to be a deadass New Yorker is to be a hustler, in whatever it is you do. If you ain’t hustling, then shit, you ain’t deadass.

Sometimes being deadass doesn’t even mean being tough. Many New Yorkers tell their experiences of being from New York as a craft. George Saunders writes for a living. So much so that he received a fellowship and many awards for his writing and is now a creative writing professor.

That’s hard as hell. Deadass. He met his wife and proposed to her three weeks later. That’s some soft shit, but good for him.

Junot Diaz lives in New York now and he’s one of the realest Dominicans alive. Word. Google him. He writes stories about his motherland of DR and is always trying new ventures for stories.

Try new shit yo. That makes you deadass. If you don’t know what you like and you travel to another state to find yourself, you a punk… Don’t come back. New York don’t need you.

But, if you got a plan and you travel to another state to set that shit in motion and then come home and get it poppin’ once you come back…that’s some real shit. You deadass.

The best way to truly be deadass is to not to care what anybody says. You ain’t even gotta believe me to be deadass. And, I’m deadass.

If someone asks you where you got your outfit from, you gotta look them up and down, make sure to make firm eye contact with ‘em and then say, in a calm but firm voice, “Google it.”

Lol, nah that’s just rude. You can tell them. But, definitely act like you spent a lot more money on it than you really did.

You gotta be high fashion if you really from New York. That don’t mean always buying the most expensive shit, real talk–New Yorkers are cheap. But, you gotta act expensive.

For example, deadass, wasn’t nobody rocking FUBU. That shit was lame, but Tommy Hilfiger was popping for quite some time. Matta fact, you could put that shit on today and still be fly. But, if you put on FUBU, you corny as shit. Prolly cause the owner was black and black people don’t know how to support each other and shit.

I mean the shit stood for “For us, by us.” That shit corny, right? Like who the fuck is us?! You feel me?

Anyway, if you tryna be deadass on some deadass shit, I got a final pointer for you:

Listen to the Ten Crack Commandments by the late and great Notorious B.I.G., then apply that shit to your life.

Whether you slinging dope in the hood, textbooks in the hills, or produce at the supermarket, stay true to yo shit.